[troutman]

Jenny McCarthy (Author, model and autism activist) blogs on HuffPo:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jenny-..._b_806857.html

This debate won't end because of one dubious reporter's allegations. I have never met stronger women than the moms of children with autism. Last week, this hoopla made us a little stronger, and even more determined to fight for the truth about what's happening to our kids.

http://www.sciencebasedmedicine.org/?cat=36

As important as Wakefield is to the genesis of the modern anti-vaccine movement, however, there is another force that acts far more “where the rubber hits the road,” so to speak. This force comes in the form of publications and online discussion forums that cater to new mothers, offering all manner of advice and support. Some of these are very good, but all too many of them are hotbeds of anti-vaccine pseudoscience, confidently proclaimed by “elder statesman” members of these forums and included in articles published in glossy, attractive magazines.

Andrew Wakefield and his fellow travelers promoting unscientific information about vaccines are definitely to blame for providing the raw material for the anti-vaccine movement, but it’s communities like MDC and magazines like Mothering that spread the message to the masses, all in the name of protecting “freedom of conscience.” Unfortunately, freedom isn’t free when it’s based on misinformation, pseudoscience, and quackery.